We are excited to give a great review of Marlene Ketchen and her design team at The Cabinetry who made our dream of a new kitchen a reality. She and her team are ‘THE BEST’ and we’ll tell you why!!!!
We evaluated two local kitchen designers and based on discussion about our vision during initial meetings, each provided us with an initial design. Out of the gate, Marlene's was outstanding. She met with us several times to understand how we intended to use the kitchen and asked us all the right questions. We are both good cooks, we love to cook and entertain, and we wanted a highly functional chef’s kitchen fully decked out. She and her team worked with us through several iterative designs as each area in the kitchen had special considerations. Not only did the final design create an amazing kitchen space with beautiful, high quality cabinetry and granite counter tops; she and her team worked through the finest details. Their special attention and considerations were given to maximize the flow, use, utility and usability of each area of the kitchen, the flow of moving around in the kitchen, the width of walkways; and with all the right sized and placed working and entertaining surface spaces, the storage volume required, and integrating all the new built-in Sub-Zero toys. She introduced us to her 3D drawing capability that showed the CAD drawings and kitchen layout as if it were complete. It was amazing to see everything depicted in real space and was a huge benefit when making selections and decisions. You’d be surprised how much 6 or 12 inches can make ALL the difference.
One major constraint of our project was the need to accommodate a steel column and beams to support the original 2nd floor structure. Marlene and team spent painstaking time to verify the details and seamlessly integrated their design with the architect of the project; actually leading the team to the exact placement of the column to accommodate her overall design. Throughout the process, she worked tirelessly with the builder to guarantee the success of her vision and related onsite construction changes. Marlene appreciated our desire to maintain a clean, bright visual space with layers of details while perfectly balancing the positioning of the islands under an eyebrow barrel ceiling, centered alignment with the rear wall refrigerator with flanking cabinets, counter tops, and lighted cabinets. Her attention to symmetry really brought life to the space. A key feature of Marlene and her services is to listen and incorporate client desires where possible.
Marlene does not upsell, she holds true to the position that only the client upsells themselves. She provided us with a wide range of design features and options that would work great in the design, but had different cost implications. We worked collaboratively with her and the team to evaluate the options and then we made our choices … and several times we loved upselling ourselves with premium selections. This trait is very comforting for a client intent on managing costs while balancing desired special premium design features. Another key feature of Marlene and her team is listening to the client and making their vision a reality. She was flawless in incorporating our vision of a coffee station unlike others. In doing so, she has created a grounding feature on one side of the kitchen that provides a “statement” furniture piece that is a functional for coffee, built-in ice maker and wine storage, and general appliance/pot storage. Definitely Unique!
Her team spent hours on the finer details and layout of the kitchen items. Attention to these details assured us everything would fit easily in the drawers and cabinets. She and her team walked us through the purpose of every drawer, every cabinet, and noted what the contents and the use were going to be. She even accommodated our 'junk' drawer in the design. Does everyone have one where all those bits and bobs, a screwdriver, pens, rubber bands, a battery or two end up? It's the little things as well as the big that make good become great.
Overall, the design is perfect and balanced. Marlene and her team’s attention to the details from the hood and corbel designs, hidden spaces to maximize use, to the style, shape, size and positioning of the pulls on each paneled appliance and every cabinet and drawer door was very important to create the beautiful, high quality, seamless, integrated, and balanced design, yet functional and elegant. Marlene's recommendations to go with 2 color tones of cabinets and 2 different granites each with a purpose was progressive and the results show her exceptional design talent; truly stunning. The layout and coloration drives emphasis and focus to the center entertaining and ‘hot’ islands while balanced with the complementary, unimposing surround cabinetry and serene granite surfaces.
It was a pleasure to work with Marlene and her team. They made the project exciting and fun. We now have a richer understanding of the level of complexity and attention to detail required to do a kitchen remodel. We have a true appreciation for the quality of talent and outstanding design expertise and professionalism that Marlene and her team have that was evident in every aspect of the project. We highly recommend Marlene and The Cabinetry design team. They took the time and directed their attention to understanding our vision and objectives, they analyzed our style and understood our cooking methods, were detailed in technical composition, and they guided us with exceptional design expertise to deliver an elegant, stunning, fully functional kitchen that you usually only see in your dreams.
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